AUDIO – DESCRIPTION:
In the 1980’s, Garfield (“Gar”) Mahood was the head of the Non-Smokers Rights Association (NSRA). The group’s purpose, essentially, was to get people to stop smoking tobacco. In this recording from the Wayne McLean talk show on Radio 98 in London, Ontario, Mahood was McLean’s in-studio guest. Freedom Party president Robert Metz calls in in reaction to Mr. Mahood’s comment, apparently made earlier in the broadcast, that if the London Free Press newspaper and other newspapers do not police themselves as he said they promised to do – i.e.., stop publishing tabacco advertisements – then the NSRA is in favour of a legislated solution (i.e., censorship). NOTE: this is the only portion of the broadcast that was recorded.

AUDIO – DESCRIPTION:
In late 1985, radical feminist Varda Burstyn was the guest of a CBC talk radio show hosted by David Shatzky. The two discussed a book that had just been published (release date: November 28, 1985): Women Against Censorship. Burstyn was the book’s editor. The book contained a number of essays concerning feminist views on pornography and how to combat it. The general message of the book was that pornography should be eliminated not by censorship but by the promotion of feminist ideas. Freedom Party of Ontario’s Robert Metz initially found the topic hopeful – because it was opposed to censorship – but his hopes quickly were dashed: Burstyn was advocating taxpayer funding for the promotion (on air, etc.) of feminism. Metz called in to the show. This is the recording of his call.

August 9, 1985. It’s the cold war, and the Berlin Wall is years away from falling. It is the 40th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan by the USA. U.S. President Ronald Reagan has announced a “Star Wars” initiative that would destroy enemy missiles before they land and do harm. Canadians hold strong views about whether to participate in the development of Star Wars. And an 18 year old young man by the name of Jamie Lefcoe (founder and president of Students United for Nuclear Sanity) is the in-studio guest of Radio 98’s Wayne McLean Hotline. Lefcoe’s group is against missile testing, and the arms race. McLean asks his callers: “Was it right for the USA to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and on Nagasaki?”, and “Should Canada be involved in Ronald Reagan’s Star Wars Program?”.

Lefcoe’s position is that Canada should not participate in Star Wars, that mutual disarmament is the way to go, and that it is irrelevant which side (USA versus the USSR) is worse. To him, the USSR’s communist philosophy and totalitarian nature is not the issue, and does not matter. Over the course of the two hour program, three Freedom Party members call in to the show: Gord Mood, Robert Metz, and Marc Emery. London West’s MP, Tom Hockin (PC) also calls in.

AUDIO – DESCRIPTION:
In 1984, Ontario’s public secondary schools were government-funded (i.e., tax-funded) in all grades, but Catholic schools were government-funded only up to grade 10. Beyond grade 10, a tuition had to be paid by the parents of students attending grades 11 through 13 at a Catholic secondary school. In June of 1984, Ontario Premier Bill Davis reversed his party’s long-standing opposition to full funding for Catholic schools: he proposed funding grades 11 through 13, beginning in September of 1985 with grade 11, adding grade 12 in 1986 and grade 13 in 1987. Catholic schools – which were private – would be turned into government schools. By August 2, 1985, an Ontario provincial general election had resulted in the ouster of the PCs (for the first time in 42 years). The province now was governed by David Peterson’s Liberals.

Peterson decided to go ahead with full funding for Catholic secondary schools, starting in September 1985. So, on August 2, 1985, talk radio host Wayne McLean (AM980, London, Ontario, a.k.a. CFPL AM, a.k.a. Radio 98) invited George McLintock (Coalition for Public Schools) and Ken Regan (London and Middlesex Catholic School Board) – opponents on the issue of full funding for Catholic schools – in-studio to address the question: “Do you support full funding for Catholic schools?”. As usual, McLean took calls from his listeners. Freedom Party president Robert Metz was among them and explained that both McLintock and Regan were on the same side: the anti-freedom side.

On July 25, 1985, Wayne McLean and Ann Robel, hosts of “Hotline” (Radio 98, London, Ontario) held a 2-hour radio discussion with Jim Keegstra, who had just been convicted in Alberta on a criminal hate speech violation: he had been sentenced to pay a fine of $5,000.00. Keegstra denied several widely accepted historical accounts of what happened in Hitler’s Germany, and believed that Jewish people – as a collective/group – were involved in a conspiracy to take over the world. Keegstra had been a mayor and a school teacher. After spending some time interviewing Keegstra, Keegstra stayed on the line as the show took calls from listeners in the London area, including Freedom Party president Robert Metz and Marc Emery (Action Director). Metz pointed out that both Keegstra and his opponents were making the same mistake: essentially judging people as a collective (in this case, Jewish people). He pointed out that such collectivism and suppression of speech were exactly the sorts of things that Hitler used to oppress Jews and others, and that gave rise to the second world war. Emery – who had personally interviewed Holocaust survivors and published their accounts in his publications, including the London Metrobulletin – explained that although he rejected Keegstra’s claims, he thought it important for every individual – right or wrong – to be free to express his or her views. He also pointed out that law enforcement tends to apply censorship laws not against big media companies, but against individuals with limited financial means of defending themselves.

Five (and, again 11) years later, the Supreme Court of Canada would reject Keegstra’s challenge to the constitutionality of Canada’s criminal law against the wilful promotion of hatred against an identifiable group. He received a one-year suspended sentence, one year of probation, and community service. Keegstra died in Alberta on June 2, 2014.

AUDIO – DESCRIPTION:
On or about April 23, 1985, the federal Special Committee on Pornography and Prostitution (also known as the “Fraser Committee”) released a report of its findings (the committee had been formed in June of 1983, and held hearings across Canada beginning in December of 1983; it held a hearing in London, Ontario on February 9, 1984). The London Status of Women Action Group was a radical feminist – i.e., cultural Marxist – group in London in the early 1980s, and had actively campaigned in favour of banning pornography. With respect to depictions of sexual activity in magazines or movies, virtually all such depictions were rejected by LSWAG as depictions of female degradation and violence against women.

On July 23, 1985, Radio 98 talk show host Wayne McLean began his show by interviewing the then-president of LSWAG, Judith Moses. Thereafter, McLean took calls from listeners in London, including Freedom Party of Ontario president Robert Metz, who shared an interesting fact about a study about men and what they find attractive or repulsive in sex between a man and a woman (the results were regularly being misrepresented by radical feminists, so as to leave the impression that men are attracted to non-consensual sex with women).

NOTE: This recording was captured from a cassette tape that had been in storage for over 30 years. The first 20 minutes of the tape suffers from increasing audio distortion, but the distortion disappears thereafter.

AUDIO – DESCRIPTION:
According to notes taken by Lloyd Walker, this call-in to a CBC (Toronto) talk radio program by Freedom Party’s Gord Mood occurred in the summer of 1985. According to the notes, the CBC host was taking calls in response to a discussion about the National Citizens’ Coalition (NCC) and unions. Mood favours open shop unions to closed shop ones, and employees getting paid according to the value of their labour.